


Uncharted

by jiokra



Category: Europa Report (2013)
Genre: Aliens, Gen, Non-Chronological, POV Multiple, Science Fiction, Tentacles, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-28
Updated: 2016-05-28
Packaged: 2018-06-07 02:15:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6781243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jiokra/pseuds/jiokra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On Earth, footage from the probe has been recovered.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Uncharted

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ExtraPenguin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExtraPenguin/gifts).



Dr. Unger sits still, eyes downcast and sorrowful. “When the probe went offline, of course there was no way for them to fix it. The technology was not available to them. Funding hadn’t been approved, as the technology would have been too costly to create, and—even if funds for engineering one had been approved—the money to have it on the spacecraft… millions, if not billions of dollars. It was inconceivable to even ask for funds, and so we never challenged the refusal. We had asked ourselves, what if? What if the probe failed? And so we amended the probe to prevent failure.”

Swallowing, Dr. Unger looks into the camera, locking onto her eyes reflected back from her in the lens. She fights the urge to glance at the director, the crew, the woman holding out the fluffy black audio devise recording the trembles in her voice she tried to stanch. Taking a breath, she says, eyes once again downcast, “Were the technology available to them, no doubt things would have went differently. Had they seen—” 

Dr. Unger’s head quivers, too slight yet exposing more of her mental state than she’d prefer. 

* * *

“Europa has water… right?” said James. He sipped from his recycled urine sampler, a brew whose price tags many-an-Earthling would have blanched at. He waited for Katya to scoff, or Dasque to cringe as she drank her sampler. Either could happen first. James didn’t want to risk it by placing a bet.

Katya smiled at the data flashing across a monitor, hands poised over a keyboard. “Don’t get your hopes up. All reports suggest high salinity levels in Europa’s oceans.” 

“ _Probable_ oceans,” said Dasque cheekily—because someone had to. 

“If we’re lucky, there could be bacteria—oh! Infectious ones, too. If we become a host for Europan disease, we wouldn’t have to enter a lab to examine petri dishes.” 

_James_ cringed, in a surprise twist he ought to have seen coming. “You gals are disgusting,” he muttered, and smirked at their stifled laughs. 

Kicking his legs out from beneath the table, he trudged toward the bunks to retrieve the video camera, the insatiable need to speak with his son rising up within him. Days had turned to weeks, soon the weeks to months, and his son stayed a perpetual baby in memory. His growth into a boy existed in a reality that was so far removed from the space ship that James likened it to a virtual reality. The space ship sometimes felt like that—a virtual reality. The very water he drank was artificial. The conversations he had with his son through the camera were artificial. At times, the very comradery between the other crew members felt artificial because they were all hand-picked by NASA through their skill sets and chemistry. They were like actors; the scene being astronauts, the overall scope being Europa. 

Sometimes James wondered if he was suffering from seasonal affective disorder. The sun was just another star in the proverbial night sky now. 

There was a snicker overhead, then Andrei said: “Who is disgusting?” 

Andrei floated through microgravity, grasping a handlebar as he neared the threshold where the buoyancy of outer space collided with the artificial gravity cultivated by the rotating spacecraft. He jumped down after crossing the invisible barrier, his boots slamming on the floor making everyone either smirk or shake their heads, as no one had yet to best his jumps. 

Hands on his hips, Andrei breathed in. “No one wants to snitch? All right, all right. I understand.” 

James snatched his camera, then whipped it around so the lens faced him, switching it on. “All right, lad, some fatherly wisdom coming your way.” James quirked his head, squinting. “Extraterrestrial life. Extra means ‘outside.’ Terrestrial comes from the Latin word ‘terrestris,’ another word for ‘earthly.’ So if we land on Europa and find aliens, big googly eyed green aliens with massive noggins, are they extraterrestrial life, or are we extraeuropian life?” 

Andrei settled down on the table with his artificial water. “This is a good question.” 

James huffed, then winked at the camera. 

“Who is to say they have to be green?” said Dasque. “Why not blue, or purple?” 

“Or invisible,” said Katya. “After all, with all that ice blocking out light, they wouldn’t need to be any vibrant color at all.” 

* * *

EXT. CONAMARA CHAOS – DAY 1 ON EUROPA (ARCHIVE)

For the longest time, there is nothing but DARKNESS. Only water and quiet. CURRENTS rock past the PROBE, drowning audio with static. 

A pale blue LIGHT emerges like stars. It GROWS in radius as the probe travels at a winding pace. A SECOND light emerges, a THIRD, a FOURTH. Flickering at a neck breaking speed, COUNTLESS LIGHTS emerge until the original light is indistinguishable. The probe continues. RADIATION distorts the footage. 

On the left, a bio-luminescent TENTACLE punches the probe and clutches it between suckers. A SECOND tentacle emerges, and soon the probe is PULLED TOWARD A BEAK. 

FEED CUTS OUT. 

* * *

“What might life look like on Europa?”

A laugh bubbles out despite himself. Dr. Solokoz glances at Dr. Unger, who battles to stomp down a smile, yet her eyes are shining. Dr. Solokoz reaches for his glass of water, hiding his look of excitement behind the rim of the glass. 

“We can’t—” he says, then presses his lips together. Shaking his head, he disregards protocol. Everyone arrived to this press conference with a wonder and glee which rivaled emotions felt during the moon landings. He couldn’t pass up indulging everyone on their collective childhood imagination about aliens. “They won’t look like us, or have a physiology similar to anything on our green planet. Life as we know it on Earth did not acquire its unique features until the Permian-Triassic extinction event. A massive— _massive_ —volcano erupted in Siberia. The ash clouds from this super volcano were so enormous and thick that it blacked out the entire atmosphere. If you could imagine the greenhouse effect on steroids, that was this event. The carbon dioxide built up until there was too much for plants to photosynthesize, and the oceans became highly acidic. Ninety-five percent of marine life died off, and the survival of mammals as we know them can be traced to a single rodent-like creature who managed to survive in this post-apocalyptic nightmare. We’re the descendants of the adorable cousins of cockroaches, basically.” 

Dr. Solokoz breaks off, breathing in deeply, and smirks at the stunned faces from all the reporters, journalists, and camera crew riveted by his tale. “That is to say: Life on Earth is unique to our planet’s history and geography. Europa didn’t experience what Earth experienced. We can’t know what life will look like, but we can be certain that it will be very, very different. Beyond our conceptualization of ‘different.’” 

* * *

EXT. CONAMARA CHAOS – DAY 4 ON EUROPA (ARCHIVE)

PROBE switches on. The SUBMERGED SPACESHIP sinks, lights flashing. BIOLUMINSECENT ALIENS resembling CEPHALOPODS tread water around the SPACESHIP, their illuminated flesh providing the ship the light necessary in order for it to be captured on film. 

A TENTACLE slaps onto the probe and JERKS it toward the mantle of a CEPHALOPOD—THE FIRST FULL IMAGE OF ALIENS. Data from probe suggests an adult female, black in color. The LIGHTS on its TENACLES begin to FLASH RHYTHMICALLY, the alien CHIRPING IN BEAT at approximately 875Hz. Soon a SECOND ALIEN emerges from below and treads water. The SECOND ALIEN grasps the probe with a tentacle, and flashes rhythmically, chirping in beat at 650Hz, at the FIRST ALIEN. 

RADIATION DISTORTS FILM. 

FILM CUTS OUT. 

[EDITOR’S NOTE: Further analysis confirms BOTH ALIENS ARE RED.] 

* * *

“Hurry up,” the Lieutenant told the investigator, beak clacking.

The device oscillated as the currents swept past, a cylindrical contraption that was terrifying the meager school of flat bodied fish that the Lieutenant’s squadron had been following into the descriptive corner of ocean for the better part of a week. At the first solid sighting of the fish, the device had appeared. Then the massive structure that would be a pain to describe to her Commander, who had been whipped across his face by their tyrannical General—who was an Acting General, since their real one couldn’t accompany them on the hunt. 

A rivaling tribe of octopedes had skirted the borders between their regions. Fish native to the Lieutenant’s region had fled, sensing the clan before they ever arrived. If the Lieutenant didn’t get rid of this probe and that blasted, massive contraption, the school of flat bodied fish may never return. And the fish native to her region wouldn’t return until the rivaling clan had left. Who couldn’t leave until they were defeated, which implied the Lieutenant’s clan gathering an army, who couldn’t fight without calories. And they couldn’t eat without the flat bodied fish. Who couldn’t be hunted until these forsaken objects returned to wherever they came from above the ice. 

The sooner the lights on the massive craft switched off, the better. 

The investigator clacked his beak. “I think it’s recording us.” 

The Lieutenant’s mantle ebbed alongside the currents. “Recording us?” she said. The investigator didn’t reply, and she watched his tentacles swirl in the water. She curled a tentacle around the device. “Get it done.” 

Then she swung around, and darted over to the massive contraption, beak quivering to quell her rage.


End file.
